The high rewards on offer in the exclusive world of Britain's boardrooms and City dealing rooms were exposed yesterday by figures showing a jump of 16% in bonus payments this year to a record £19bn.

That is equivalent to the country's entire annual transport budget. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) released its annual estimate of the scale of bonuses showing they rose by £2.5bn this year, following a £1.5bn rise last year, meaning they have leapt by a quarter in two years.

Analysis of preliminary ONS data by the Guardian shows the level of bonuses amounted to £19bn in the early months of this year, when bonuses are traditionally paid. Most will have been paid to top-flight people in the City of London and Canary Wharf. Financial services bonuses accounted for about £10bn of the overall figure, by far the largest chunk and equivalent to £25,000 for every City worker.

But the big bonuses, often amounting to many millions of pounds, go to a small number of investment bankers or financiers who pull in large amounts of business for their employer or secure large merger deals. Many banks in the City have reported record profits on the back of rising share prices and a boom in mergers and acquisitions.

Big City bonuses are regularly cited by London estate agents as a key factor pushing up property prices in the capital and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors last week reported that demand from City bankers had helped to push farmland prices to record levels.

Britain's banks together made a record £33bn of profits in 2005 and, after a bumper first half, are set to outstrip that this year despite the rising level of personal insolvencies and bad debts.

The ONS said the overall bonus figures cover the vast majority of Britain's companies, include bonuses to boardroom executives. Profits have been high across much of British business with oil companies such as BP and Shell thriving on the tripling of oil prices over the past couple of years.

The bonus news drew criticism from the trade unions. Frances O'Grady, the TUC deputy general secretary, said: "People clearly need to be rewarded for doing a good job, but the huge amounts being paid out in City bonuses continue to beggar belief. Many working people helping to deliver vital services can only dream of earning what a small number of City high-flyers receive each year in their annual bonus."

Peter Montagnon, director of investment affairs at the Association of British Insurers, which speaks for some of the City's most powerful institutional investors, said there was at least more of a link with performance in the City than in many boardrooms.

"My impression has always been that City bonuses go down as well as up," he said. "They have a pretty close link to performance, almost certainly closer than that achieved in the publicly listed sector where, over a long period, we have seen evidence of upward creep."